


Where did you throw away your dreams? (When did you forget your love?)

by AngstyDathomirians



Category: Gake no Ue no Ponyo | Ponyo
Genre: Backstory, Dysfunctional Family, F/M, Family Feels, Gen, Prequel, Unreliable Narrator, and inferrals of background events, because pov is a literal child, lots of vague descriptions, throws my pointless headcanons at you
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-10
Updated: 2020-06-10
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:53:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24645952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AngstyDathomirians/pseuds/AngstyDathomirians
Summary: In which Brunnhilde watches the ocean change around her, and feels a bit left behind in the wake of the waves
Relationships: Granmammare/Fujimoto (Ponyo)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 32





	Where did you throw away your dreams? (When did you forget your love?)

**Author's Note:**

> *emerges from the dark hole of my writing hiatus to post a tiny fic in a nonexistent fandom that no one cares about*

Her father’s hands were always warm, either from his magic or just himself, she didn’t know. They were constantly in motion, stroking the smooth surface of her eggshell and filling the enclosed space with the tingling warmth of contentment. She hadn’t opened her eyes yet, or maybe couldn’t see through her shell, but when she didn’t touch the sides it felt like floating through a great black void. Before she could squirm in dismay, the gentle heat of his presence surrounded her, whispering, _safety_. 

Her mother’s hands were cool and steady, a soothing, grounding surety. They carefully supported her as she turned and twisted in her shell, growing stronger. When her mother held her, her tiny world was filled with a dim, gentle golden light, dazzling her newly-awakened senses – old, and tranquil, but vibrant and fluid all the same.

After she hatched, it was just the three of them, and life was good. She learned to swim in her mother’s golden wake, on the green slopes and coral forests of her father’s home. The ocean turned inky black every night, but silver light came down from above, and the coral glowed, and she was lulled to sleep by an omnipresent glow and the fantastic tales of her parents. They traveled often, pulling the tides with them, replenishing the vast shoals of fish and salvaging shipwrecks from above.

She was often frightened by the power her parents held – her father summoning the wind and spirits of the waves, her mother growing as large as one of the humans’ ships and pulling the storm surges apart in her grasp, creating mountains and valleys of water on the surface of their home. 

She glanced down at her own stubby fins and shimmery red tail, and wondered why she didn’t have hands and feet like her parents; she looked at the twisted heaps of wood and metal on the ocean floor, and the vast white light that beamed down from beyond the edge of their realm, and wondered where they came from.

“Daddy, what’s that light?” she asked, peering upwards from one of the circular windows on his ship. 

He was seated at his desk, absently riffling through one of his worn spellbooks. “That’s the sun, Brunnhilde. It gives energy to everything in the ocean, except at the very bottom.”

“Is that where humans come from?”

“Not from the sun, sweetheart.” There was an odd tension in his rough timbre. “They live on land. It’s…like the ocean floor, but covered with air instead of water.”

She frowned, trying to visualize the odd concept. “What do they eat? How do they move around?”

The book closed with a thud. “You shouldn’t be asking so many questions about them.”

She blinked; her daddy always allowed questions about the ocean, even encouraged them. What was wrong about this? “But Mommy says you were human once. She tells me the story about how you met almost every night –“

Now he looked at her, the markings on his cheeks flushing a deeper color. “That’s enough,” he commanded. “Don’t ask me again, Brunnhilde. Humans are dangerous, and that’s all you need to know for now.”

“Fine,” she muttered.

She forgot about land when they were joined by Adelaide, Athena, and Hera. Her sisters were tiny and fragile, squeaking with pleasure as she played with them and proudly taught them to swim. They had fins and tails like her, and they chased each other around the reefs while their father worked. 

Life was more hectic now, but no less pleasant. They wrapped themselves, giggling, in their father’s thick hair while he sighed good-naturedly, and gasped with awe as their mother spun stories and conjured images of the ancient creatures of the deep. 

The water started to taste different, acrid, more pungent, like the fuel of the human ships. They traveled much more now.

Their mother was often gone for long periods of time, but now it could be moon-cycles before she returned. They gained new sisters every time, Eurydice and Idunn and Diana and Johanna. Their father still played with them when they begged, and told them a story every night, but he was in his study more often than not, and he slept later in the day. 

They still swam among the reefs, but the shells of the coral were weaker. The water still had that funny taste.

They hardly ever went outside anymore without seeing one of the human fishing boats passing overhead. They had to be careful to avoid debris on the ocean floor. Their mother’s returns felt more like visits than homecomings. 

As her sisters slept among the nooks and crannies of their father’s home, she slipped out, heading for a window and intending a moonlight swim among the coral, maybe even a glimpse of the lights from the human ships. Her parents’ voices stopped her. 

They were in his study, and she wriggled closer to listen. 

“Something’s wrong,” her father muttered. “The ocean is changing.”

“The ocean has always changed,” her mother replied serenely. “That is its nature.”

Her father was pacing the small space, picking at his hands. “This feels different. Unnatural. I always knew the humans were dangerous, but only now do I see the full extent of the destruction they could cause.”

“Destruction is the way of things,” her mother said softly. “For everything they destroy, something new will be created. You are proof of that.”

“I’m not enough,” he said hoarsely. He looked up at his wife uncertainly. “You believe all will be well?”

“I know it, my darling. This storm will pass.” Her mother took her father’s hands. “I also know you feel I’ve abandoned you.”

He blinked, then shook his head assuredly. “No, my dear. You have your responsibilities, as I have mine. If this is the way things must be for now…” He sighed. “I always knew this might happen. It didn’t stop me then.”

“Do not despair, beloved,” her mother said gently. “As long as there is life in the ocean, you and I are one. And I will always come when you need me.”

They kissed, long and gentle.

She wriggled out of her hiding place and back towards her sisters, adventurous appetite squashed for now. She didn’t quite understand what her parents were talking about, but she wanted to be able to hold hands and kiss someone like that.  


“I don’t like this, Daddy,” she protested.

Her father held a squirming Amelie in one hand, trying to coax her to eat, while simultaneously attempting to reign in his other rowdy offspring. “Come on, sweetheart, just a bite – Elissa, don’t eat that! – Freyja, honey, I need that! – I know it’s not ideal, Brunnhilde, but I just need you-“ he gestured helplessly – “all in one place right now!”

“You’re locking us in a bubble!” she wailed.

“It’s not forever, sweetheart-“

She pouted. “I’m not doing it.”

He released Amelie to bury his hands in his thick red hair exasperatedly. “Brunnhilde-“

“I just want to go outside,” she muttered. “It’s boring in here.”

“It’s too dangerous; remember when you were almost all caught in that net?”

“Then come with us! You’re always _working_ now.”

It was true; he was still scratching calculations when they fell asleep at night, and brewing elixirs long before they rose in the morning. She wasn’t even sure he slept at all anymore. He fed them their meals, then disappeared to his study for hours on end, only emerging when they begged. 

“I’m sorry, Brunnhilde, the balance of the ocean is in a very precarious position right now. I have to counteract acidification and overfishing and oil spills and – and – human _garbage_ every day now! And with your mother gone so much I can’t watch all of you at once – Marguerite, get out from behind there!” 

She huffed out a sigh. He was always going on about the “balance of the ocean” when they pulled him from his work, but nothing seemed to be getting better no matter how long he slaved away. “Will you _ever_ be done?”

“When the humans are gone, maybe,” he said sourly.

“Why don’t you just talk to them? If they knew what they were doing, maybe they’d stop –“

“You’re too young to understand,” he cut her off bitterly. He met her gaze as he finally succeeded in corralling her sisters into the enchanted bubble he had created, large enough to freely swim, but still looking disturbingly like a cage. “Promise me you won’t do anything rash, Brunnhilde.”

“Okay, Daddy,” she murmured.

“Are you almost done? We’re all waiting for you.”

Her father was, as usual, seated at his desk, absently chewing on his pen over the sheets of calculations and diagrams around him. “Erm – I’m sorry, Brunnhilde, I’ll be up as soon as I can, but there was another _cursed_ – another oil pipe burst in the north, and I need to rebalance the water. This will take me a while yet. Don’t wait for me.”

“But we can’t go to sleep without a story! Can’t it wait?!”

“I don’t think so, sweetheart.”

“I don’t wanna go back to the bubble. You’re not as much fun as you used to be,” she muttered under her breath. Of course he didn’t hear her. Glancing around at the haphazard mess strewn around them, she asked slightly louder, “When’s Mommy coming home?”

He sighed, an aching, weary sound. “I don’t know.”

It was time to leave. The ocean was balanced, but her family wasn’t – her mother gone, her father barely holding it all together. It was time, to leave it all behind. She would miss her sisters, but even they weren’t worth a lifetime in a bubble. 

The great white light glimmered invitingly from above. She remembered asking her daddy what the sun was, so long ago, and felt a slight pain in her stomach, but the sparkling promise of freedom and adventure lured her onwards.

She slipped away from his ship determinedly, unseen; and Brunnhilde rose up, up towards the light. 

**Author's Note:**

> Yes Fujimoto named every one of his hundreds of daughters and they all have mythology names, what of it


End file.
